Why Your House Cleaner Hates You

In the tradition of our anonymous flight attendant, book buyer, and yoga instructor -- the quintessential house cleaner shares her anecdotes of keeping things organized and Why Your House Cleaner Hates You, as told to this writer.No, we are not revealing her identity, as she respects her employers and their homes.

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The real me: For the most part I like to clean. As I grew into adulthood, I assumed that everyone else was as tidy as I was ... My house-cleaning jobs began when I went back to college and cleaned a few friends' houses between classes.

Often when I would tell people what I was doing for work they would say, "I can get you so much work! None of my friends can communicate with their Spanish housekeepers!" So the word spread quickly, and soon I had several regular house cleaning jobs.

Problems arose, though, as many of my clients knew each other and some would try to get me to spill the beans on how messy the other clients were. I learned the hard way that gossiping and house cleaning do not mix ...

Unless, that is, I can share a few things with you. There are some things that make me cranky when cleaning for others and a few things you should NEVER do to your house cleaner. The following are all essential, but are in no particular order:

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1. Does no one besides me and my dead father (when he was alive) make their beds? I have found all sorts of weird things in my clients beds that had nothing to do with their sex lives. How does anyone sleep with remote controls, stuffed animals, doggy chews, books, laundry and dirty dishes cluttering their beds?

2. Used condoms stuck to the floor next to the bed (yes, this has happened). I know you are in the throws of post-coital bliss but for fuck's sake keep a trash can by your damn bed!

3. Your personal bottle of KY lube should be put in your bed side drawer, not IN your bed. Are you too drunk to find your bedside drawer?

4. Anything that you don't want your house keeper to find or is of value to you should be removed from your pockets before I put your clothes into the laundry. I do not want to be responsible for destroying your drivers license, Visa card, cash or valuable receipts and I do not want to know which strip clubs you spend your time at, sorry.

5. The toilet looks like the public restroom in a subway station. The bathroom is where we go to get clean so why would you leave it such a mess?

6. Cat vomit: I NEVER like to find this under furniture and can always tell when it was left there for me to clean up. And same goes for dog poop/pee/vomit -- do a better job at potting training your dog.

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7. Decapitated creatures that the dog or cat mauled and left under the dining room table many days ago: If you can not smell this rotting under your furniture then it is time to go see a specialist.

8. Nothing in the kitchen has been cleaned since the last time I cleaned your kitchen. This seems to be a recurring theme in every house I have cleaned. For some reason clients think that I can get days old dried food off of their stove tops, casserole dishes and pots and pans. If your dishwasher can't get this old food off of your dishes why do you think I can?

9. If I find your kids stash am I supposed to tell you about it and if so, what is the benefit for me? Please do not ask me to be your house cleaning narc. It wasn't cool in high school and even less so now.